The man Ingram named worked as a Greens staff member on three separate occasions during the election campaigns.

Ingram reported the man to the NSW Greens in February this year.

However, many women who volunteered with the Greens had known about the alleged rape for over a year before Ingram's complaint was lodged.

Volunteers rely on word of mouth

A young Greens volunteer, who does not want to be named, said that because of the party's inaction on this issue, volunteers were forced to protect each other by spreading rumours about the man's behaviour.

"I was first told about this person very early on into being associated with the Young Greens," she says.

"I was approached privately by a friend, someone high up in the Young Greens who just wanted to warn me before I'd met this person that they were a known rapist, they were a known harasser of women, and if I come in contact with him just to be very cautious of that and to limit my contact with him as much as possible.

"I was told very explicitly that he had raped people. I was told that he had harassed and touched people that I'm friends with without their consent."

Another Greens member says she was also warned about the alleged rapist when she volunteered for a Greens federal election campaign.

"I was volunteering there and he was helping me with my computer, and then my friend said, 'He's not a nice guy' … later she told me, 'He's an awful person, he stalked me, and he violently raped someone," she said.

Lesa De Leau, who sits on the NSW Greens executive, initially told Background Briefing the new sexual harassment policy was not formulated to address the alleged behaviour of any one particular party member.

"One of my briefs was to lead a review of our governance policy … we had a list of specific policies that we wanted to both review and expand," she said.

"So a group of senior women in the Greens got together to draft the preventing and responding to sexual harassment policy. We consulted with our women's working group, with the young greens, and that policy was operational in January 2017."

When directly questioned on whether they drafted the policy to specifically respond to one matter, she replied: "Not for one specific matter, no."

But Background Briefing has independently verified that the policy was formulated in response to complaints about the man who allegedly raped Ingram.

Ms De Leau now retracts her statement that the review was not in response to a specific case.

UPDATE: The man in question has now responded, saying he denies all the allegations.

He wrote in an email that he believes that in Australia, justice is served through our established justice system and that it cannot be served through the "social media lynch mob".